Ode on Solitude

By Alexander Pope

Happy the man, whose wish and care A few paternal acres bound, Content to breathe his native air, In his own ground.
Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread, Whose flocks supply him with attire, Whose trees in summer yield him shade, In winter fire.

Blest, who can unconcernedly find Hours, days, and years slide soft away, In health of body, peace of mind, Quiet by day,

Sound sleep by night; study and ease, Together mixed; sweet recreation; And innocence, most does please, With meditation.

In the middle of a billion stars

Happy the woman
Who dreams and daresUnseen, unknown, and quite alone
In the middle of a billion starsWho finds a bit of piece of mind
Quoting verse
In her corner of the universe
All the whileIn peaceful meditation
Chanting sweet incantations
In a Stressless chair

There is much wisdom books, but wisdom, by this I mean true wisdom, wisdom which we apply and use, is not found it is learned.

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe

[Shipwrecked on a desert isle]

SEPTEMBER 30, 1659. – I, poor miserable Robinson Crusoe, being shipwrecked during a dreadful storm in the offing, came on shore on this dismal, unfortunate island, which I called “The Island of Despair”; all the rest of the ship’s company being drowned, and myself almost dead.

Castaway on a dessert isle with a Stressless recliner
Castaway on a desert isle with a Stressless recliner

[By the end of the second year]

From this moment I began to conclude in my mind that it was possible for me to be more happy in this forsaken, solitary condition than it was probable I should ever have been in any other particular state in the world; and with this thought I was going to give thanks to God for bringing me to this place…

[In the fifth year wherein he makes a great discovery]

In the first place, I was removed from all the wickedness of the world here. I had neither the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, or the pride of life. I had nothing to covet, for I had all that I was now capable of enjoying. I was lord of the whole manor; or if I pleased, I might call myself king or emperor over the whole country which I had possession of. There were no rivals: I had no competitor, none to dispute sovereignty or command with me. I might have raised shiploadings of corn, but I had no use of it; so I let as little grow as I thought enough for my occasion. I had tortoise or turtles enough, but now and then one was as much as I could put to any use. I had timber enough to have built a fleet of ships. I had grapes enough to have made wine, or to have cured into raisins, to have loaded that fleet when they had been built.

[Finding a footprint in the sand]

How strange a chequer-work of Providence is the life of man! and by what secret different springs are the affections hurried about, as different circumstances present! To-day we love what to-morrow we hate; to-day we seek what to-morrow we shun; to-day we desire what to-morrow we fear, nay, even tremble at the apprehensions of. This was exemplified in me, at this time, in the most lively manner imaginable; for I, whose only affliction was that I seemed banished from human society, that I was alone, circumscribed by the boundless ocean, cut off from mankind, and condemned to what I call silent life; that I was as one whom Heaven thought not worthy to be numbered among the living, or to appear among the rest of His creatures; that to have seen one of my own species would have seemed to me a raising me from death to life, and the greatest blessing that Heaven itself, next to the supreme blessing of salvation, could bestow; I say, that I should now tremble at the very apprehensions of seeing a man, and was ready to sink into the ground at but the shadow or silent appearance of a man having set his foot in the island.

[His return to England]

When I took leave of this island, I carried on board, for relics, the great goat-skin cap I had made, my umbrella, and one of my parrots; also, I forgot not to take the money I formerly mentioned, which had lain by me so long useless that it was grown rusty or tarnished, and could hardly pass for silver till it had been a little rubbed and handled, as also the money I found in the wreck of the Spanish ship. And thus I left the island, the 19th of December, as I found by the ship’s account, in the year 1686, after I had been upon it eight-and-twenty years, two months, and nineteen days; being delivered from this second captivity the same day of the month that I first made my escape in the long-boat from among the Moors of Sallee. In this vessel, after a long voyage, I arrived in England the 11th of June, in the year 1687, having been thirty-five years absent.

Stress less – the opposite of stress, having no worry, anxiety, trouble, or difficulty; this deer has no fear of man, and therefore has achieved a state of being stressless.

How to reduce stress:

1. Meditate, think happy thoughts.
2. Breathe Deeply. Take a 5-minute break outside and breathe the fresh air.
3. Be Present, life is made of moments, don’t miss it.
4. Reach Out, connect with the mysteries of the universe.
5. Buy a Stressless recliner, it really is the world’s ultimate chair.

Here I sit on a rock and broken-hearted, tried to rise but only started. Soon I heard a voice softly calling, saw a crab in the sand quickly crawling. Then I fell asleep and dreamed of a perfect place far away and quiet.

Is it not a strange thought that from a chair a thousand novels have been writ, dreams dreamt, and history made. And yet, as Henrik Ibsen wrote, “Not a thousand words will make the mark a single deed will leave.”

The words are from Ibsen’s play, Brand. The name of the play translates in Norwegian as “fire”, but it is the surname of the central character.

The source of the quote

An idealistic but dogmatic priest struggles with his conscience and his vision of God. In Act 2, Brand returns to the place where he was born to find famine has reduced the village to rations. Brand and the village mayor discuss whether it is better to feed the soul or the body.

A woman arrives from a remote place across the fjord with the sad tale that her husband has killed one of their children as he could not bear to see the child starve. The husband then injured himself in an attempt at suicide. As a consequence, he now needs absolution. Despite the bad weather, Brand enters a boat and crosses the fjord with the wife. Brand finds the man and gives him absolution. He then wishes to return home, but a group of men confront him and there is another conversation about the body and soul. The men then explain that they have no village priest.

Eventually, one man in the group says this:

The Man.

A thousand speeches, Brand
Less deeply than one dint of deed.
Here, in our fellows’ name we stand;
We see, a man is what we need.

A Stressless short story

It was Saturday morning and the first day of spring. The weather was cloudy and cool.Because I thought it might rain, I was wearing a short light grey trench coat, the kind Audrey Hepburn wore in Charade. But maybe, I was just trying to be incognito.

I am not really kidding you am I? Incognito? I was as inconspicuous as Peter Sellers playing Inspector Clouseau minus the drop brim fedora and mustache.
Five minutes before, I had just arrived after an 8-hour, sleepless flight from Heathrow to Dulles. The Metro was due to arrive in two minutes. Then my baby called, saying she had missed her connection in Atlanta. Next flight noon.

Stranger things have happened

There it was, a Stressless recliner in the middle of the plaza.
That is strange, but stranger still is the fact that it was empty. No one, not a soul, seemed to see it. And baby, it was calling my name.

The ultimate comfort

I felt relieved as I sat down. I stretched out my arms and back, and felt the chair magically adjust. I closed my eyes and began to sing, “Ain’t got time to take a fast train…”

And soon I was asleep.

Aer-o-planes and fast trains

I dreamed of my baby comin’ home to me.

Gimme a ticket for an aeroplane
Ain’t got time to take a fast train
Lonely days are gone, I’m a-goin’ home

Wayne Carson wrote and composed “The Letter” after his father suggested an opening line, “Give me a ticket for an aeroplane.” The track was recorded in Memphis with a local five-man group in a session produced by Dan Penn. The band members were Alex Chilton on vocals, Danny Smythe on drums, Russ Caccamisi on bass, John Evans on keyboards, and Richard Malone on guitar. The session took over 30 takes to get it right, with Penn suggesting to Chilton he pronounce the title “aer-o-plane”. After the session, Penn added the sound of an airplane take-off.
The song took off and reached #1 position for a total of four weeks, Billboard ranked the record as the No. 2 song for 1967.